Saturday, May 30, 2015

Almost a year ago I signed up for the second time to attend Workshops in Italy, and I can't believe the time has come! For the last few weeks I have been preparing surfaces to paint on, mounting primed linen onto MDF panels. Mounting and toning, that has been my studio life recently.

The goal for this trip is to accomplish 12 - 14 plein air paintings, although the trip is eleven days, we only have seven full days of painting.

The panels have been packed and so are my paints…I'm ready!!!! I can't wait to share my Italian paintings when I come back in two weeks. See you then!

Thursday, May 21, 2015

These are the most recent monotypes, all have been done during the Salmagundi Club monotype parties. As I continue working in this new medium I can start to see growth, which makes it very rewarding. Keeping this up will not difficult at all, since I can honestly say that I've become addicted to monotypes. More to come!

Thursday, May 14, 2015

This is the my most recent studio painting which will be exhibited early in June at Mehu Gallery in NYC. Although the subject of the painting is a horse at pasture wearing a fly mask, the focus of the piece is the landscape and the almost brooding effect the light of dusk has on the space. I was invited to show in an exhibition titled Equus and Such, and the theme is the horse. On a trip to Main in 2007 I encountered a pasture where two horses grassed wearing fly masks. Not knowing much about horses or their upkeep I thought it strange and slightly frightening. Since then I had been wanting to paint what I saw that day, and this exhibition provided the nudge I needed to get it started. My main concern was how to paint a landscape with a horse without it looking cute or sentimental? I knew the mask would take care of part of the issue, but I needed something else. I thought of a painting I love at the Met, a beautiful landscape by Charles-Francois Daubigny that is tucked away in a quiet corner of the museum, away from the other nineteenth French landscape painters such as Corot and Rousseau. Not sure how I came to think of Daubigny's work when I did, but I'm glad it happened because thanks to that I was able to execute a painting that is different than what I have done in the past.Equus and Such will be on display from June 4 - July 12, 2015. Opening reception on Thursday, June 4 from 6 - 9 pm. Mehu Gallery is located at 21 W. 100th st, NYC. 212.222.3334. Gallery hours: Tuesday - Sunday 1 - 6pm. Closing reception Sunday, July 12 from 3 - 6pm.

Sunday, May 10, 2015

This is the first group of monotypes I made last year. Some more successful than others, but this was the learning period. It takes some getting used to; sometimes too much ink gets rubbed off, sometimes not enough, and tones print darker than expected, the light reflecting off the copper or zinc plate can mislead you. Regardless of how tricky monotype printing can be though, I have been hooked.

Tuesday, May 05, 2015

We are starting to have beautiful weather in the East Coast, and that means my plein air gear gets the dust brushed off and it goes back to work. Saturday was such an incredible day for painting, not too hot and not too cold. I visited a spot in Wethersfield, Connecticut; a place I have not been to since I was in high school. Off to the side of Wethersfield Cove Path I found this great spot which reminded me a lot of many paintings I have seen by Monet, Pissarro, and Sysley. On my bus ride back to Connecticut I was looking at three apps dedicated to each painter, I guess I was searching for inspiration, and it worked because at the moment I encountered this area of the Cove I immediately got in the zone and began working, thus kicking off plein air season for me. In this painting I can see some improvements, it makes me very excited to see what future paintings will look like once I get the hang of it back again. More to come!

About Me

"Anything under the sun is beautiful if you have the vision-it is the seeing of the thing that makes it so."
- Charles W. Hawthorne -
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"One of the functions of art is to remind us of common humanity. The artist, like the priest, can sometimes remind us that we are bound by an obligation to one another stronger and more lasting than the bonds of politics or economics."
- John Manchip White, Diego Velazquez: Painter and Courtier -
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"To defend an artist as original says little about his work except that it is in some way different from what preceded it. As such, originality itself is rarely a strong defense, for it is born more of admiration for audacity and perseverance than necessarily of understanding." - James H. Rubin, Manet's Silence and the Poetics of Bouquets -